


O' Valley of Plenty

by cordelianoir



Category: The Witcher (TV), Wiedźmin | The Witcher - All Media Types
Genre: F/M, Geralt is an emotionally repressed potato, Jaskier is a national treasure, M/M, POV Multiple, Soulmate AU, Witchers don't have soul marks... or do they, soulmate identifying marks, the name of your soulmate is on your body
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-02-26
Updated: 2020-05-19
Packaged: 2021-02-28 01:07:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 10,795
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22905235
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cordelianoir/pseuds/cordelianoir
Summary: "With all of Jaskier’s songs about love lost and won, all his songs about soulbonds and the number of men and women he took to bed, Geralt would have thought that Jaskier would be flashing his name about like it was silver. But during that first adventure with the elves, Jaskier never brought it up..."Soulmate AU where everyone has the name of their one true mate… except for Witchers. While traveling, Jaskier and Geralt happen upon an old friend that will make Geralt question his long-held belief that no one could want to be bound to a Witcher.
Relationships: Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia/Jaskier | Dandelion, OC/OC
Comments: 101
Kudos: 380





	1. One - Geralt

**Author's Note:**

> Hello all, this is my first foray into the Witcher fandom and I have only just been introduced to the story via the lovely Netflix show. I've tried to do my research as best I can, but please be gentle with me if anything is not consistent with the world. If you'd like to let me know any issues you see, please do, but I am also taking a few liberties since this is a soulmate AU and all. I didn't want to screw up an existing character so my other Witcher, Clandis, in this is based on an amalgamation of Witcher's profiles that I read on wikipedia.
> 
> I live on comments, so if you feel so inclined to leave one, that would undoubtably make my day!

In Geralt’s experience, people like Jaskier were always quick to show off their soul mark. Men like Jaskier believe in love. Believed in fate that brought two people together, that the words that scrawled themselves across human skin were destiny’s ultimate call to bind two souls together into one perfect whole.

It was hogwash. All of it.

Geralt had seen too many soul bonds to count over the years. They were just as often ways of justifying unhappy and abusive marriages as they were bonds of love.

Still, with all of Jaskier’s songs about love lost and won, all his songs about soulbonds and the number of men and women he took to bed, Geralt would have thought that Jaskier would be flashing his name about like it was silver. But during that first adventure with the elves, Jaskier never brought it up.

Even later, after they’d stumbled across each other again in another pub in another town, Jaskier didn’t show off his name. He didn’t peel back his shirtsleeve or pant leg and show off the letters of his soulmate’s name. He didn’t wax poetic about how they formed the letters of their name or how it sounded like sunshine or any such nonsense. He never brought it up at all.

Even when it would have been natural. When they found themselves bathing in snowmelt runoff or peeling off rain-soaked clothes after arriving at an inn with only one room available. Geralt expected at any moment for find some part of Jaskier’s nude body shoved in front of his face, expected to be forced into admiring someone’s name inked into his skin. But he never did.

He never asked about Geralt’s name either. It would have been rude. It was common knowledge that Witchers didn’t have soul marks. But Jaskier asked him about every other aspect of his life, from what he wore to how he fought to how a bottle of Swallow potion felt as it slid down his throat.

On one particularly memorable occasion, Jaskier had come so close to him that Geralt had expected to end up with a lap full of bard for a moment. He’d traced over the bulging veins and too-pale skin the potions had left and just… watched as Geralt’s eyes slowly returned to normal. Watched the pitch black slowly fade and shrink until the edge of gold irises were visible again, until his eyes were his own again. Then Jaskier stood up, brushed off his pants and declared the transformation to be the “Weirdest shit I’ve seen in my life. I mean it, Geralt, and I’ve seen some strange things hanging about you.”

Well, Jaskier wasn’t exactly known for his tact.

He had his moments though, like when he had finished playing for the night in some backwater inn and half the town’s women were flocking around him like bitches in heat. It wasn’t just women of course, just that the men tended to be more subtle about it, especially in the countryside where men tumbling men was… discouraged.

Geralt certainly didn’t care. So long as Jaskier didn’t try to ravish his conquests in the same room that Geralt was trying to sleep in, the bard could do whatever he liked. Whoever he liked.

Some people thought that people should wait until they’d met their soulmate to have sex. That or until they were married to someone of equal birth at the very least. Jaskier obviously didn’t share this opinion. He took anyone to bed who so much as flirted with him, anyone with a quick smile who was interested in spreading their legs.

Geralt wasn’t either of those things. But sometimes… Sometimes he’d imagine walking across those crowded rooms and batting off Jaskier’s many admirers and hauling the bard upstairs himself. Not that he would.

But part of him was curious. Part of him wanted to strip Jaskier down, literally and metaphorically. Find the soulmark he never spoke of and wring the story out of Jaskier’s lips. For as much as the bard talked, it was the one subject he never broached. He had a number of songs on the subject, but he only ever brought them up when someone specifically asked.

Geralt had the feeling that he knew the answer. Had a feeling that the name across Jaskier’s skin was greyed out, the ink faded to reflect the death of a soulmate. But even that would be a story, surely. Surely a dead soulmate was something that Jaskier would have mentioned in his endless prattle. Geralt waited and listened, but Jaskier never brought it up.

They had just met up again, about two weeks ago. Geralt with a fresh kikimore on Roach’s back and Jaskier fresh off his most recent heartbreak.

“She thought I was her soulmate,” Jaskier said. It was the closest he’d ever come to the topic. Gerlat just grunted.

“She had the name Jaskier of Brugge just below her left breast,” he went on. “Beautiful handwriting, very… flourished. She wouldn’t believe me when she said it wasn’t me. She said that she’s been following my music for years and that she knew that it was me. I mean she was beautiful, don’t get me wrong, but I’ve never even been to Brugge.”

Geralt just grunted non-commitally. They were approaching a small town south of Redania that was reported to have a healer. Hopefully the healer would be interested in the kikimore bits and the drowner livers in Roach’s saddlebags. Geralt was getting tired of carting them around, and the liver were bound to start stinking soon in the early summer heat.

The first person they encountered in the town was a young woman, her soulmark was large and more obvious than most, scrawling across the exposed skin of her neck.

“You can move along, Witcher,” she said, wiping her hands on her apron. Even without meaning to, Gerlat’s enhanced sense of smell meant that he could pick up the smells of flour and freshly baked bread on her clothes and hair. The town was big enough to have a dedicated baker, then.

“Come now, madam,” Jaskier called, shading his eyes from the sun and pouring charm into his words. “There must be some creature you need slain, some song you need sung—”

“We’ve already got one of his kind here, we’ve no need of another,” she said simply, pulling up a pail of water from the well and pouring it into a bucket to take back into town.

“Really?” Jaskier said, sending a look over his shoulder to Geralt. “There’s another witcher in town?”

“Yes,” the girl looked exasperated now. “Go talk to the healer, she should still be at the market. She can tell you anything you want to know about the Witcher.”

Jaskier gave Geralt a silly look he couldn’t even begin to decipher.

They trailed the unhappy baker into town until she shooed them away toward a woman with long waves of brown hair. When she turned to face them, her clear blue eyes lit up in a way that was eerily familiar.

“Julian?”

“Rose!”

Beside him, Jaskier leapt ahead of Geralt and Roach, embracing the village healer and swinging her around.

“What on earth are you doing here?” Jaskier exclaimed, keeping his hands on the woman’s waist. Another one of his seemingly endless conquests, then.

“I could ask you the same thing!” she exclaimed, picking up her basket from the ground where she’d dropped it and using the other hand to push unruly curls from her face. “The last I heard you were off to Oxenfurt.”

“Yes, I studied for a while then I changed my name and went off in search of adventure.”

By this point, Geralt had drawn close enough to scent the medicinal twang of herbs around the woman, and also something strangely familiar. Something that almost smelled like…

“Clandis.”

Geralt didn’t realize that he’d spoken aloud until both humans turned their bright cornflower-blue eyes to him. Geralt heard her heart rate pick up, but didn’t get any of the acrid scent of fear he usually smelled when he got close to unsuspecting humans.

“Uh, no,” Jaskier piped up, as if he were the center of the conversation. “Geralt, let me introduce you to my cousin, Rosalina—”

“Rosalina Emiliana Pankraz of Lettenhove,” Geralt finished for him. Jaskier’s eyes got impossibly wider.

The healer’s posture straightened ever so slightly, as if she was steeling herself for a fight. But instead of flinging insults, as Geralt had expected, she held out her hand.

“Well met, brother,” she said, only the faintest wobble evident in her voice.

It was an old greeting. One that Witches were meant to extend to one another if they met along the Path. It was not something Geralt had ever expected to hear from a woman.

But he had been the one to spy the writing on Clandis’ hip bone. Geralt had been the one to see the ink form into a woman’s name, had been the one to memorize the curves of the letters before Clandis was pulled away by the elder wichers to have the words burned off with the red-hot flat of a knife. And when they’d been alone, hunting a deer in the mountains close to the school but far enough away not to be seen, Geralt had been the one to draw that name in the snow so that Clandis could see. He’d done his best to recreate the swirl of the R and the way Lettenhove was written with less care than the name itself. They’d stared at it for just a moment before they kicked the snow up and buried the letters forever. Back then, neither of them had the time to think about soulmates, but Clandis always looked a little wistful whenever the topic was brought up.

Clandis had seen Geralt’s mark as well. When they’d been stripping out of armor for bed, Clandis had seen the long black name formed across Geralt’s shoulder blade. He’d offered to return the favor, offered to draw the name he saw, but Geralt had just thrown a handful of snow in his face. The truth was that he didn’t want to know. He didn’t want to know the name of the one fate had intended for him. Geralt didn’t want to taste the name of someone he’d never meet, someone who would have been his soul match had he not been made a witcher.

Because Geralt knew that their matches would never want to be bound to a witcher. It was too risky. Their eyes and bodies were too strange to be wanted by someone down the mountain.

And yet…

Here stood a woman whose name he had seen all those years ago painted across the planes of his friend’s stomach. Here stood a woman who reeked of Clandis, who called Geralt brother as if… as if she were wed to a witcher.

Wed to a witcher and proud of it.

Stiffly, Geralt extended a hand, clasping her forearm and shaking it once, firmly.

“Well met, Sister Witcher.”

Rosalina let out the softest of sighs and her shoulders lost some of their stiffness. She smiled, then. A bright, carefree smile as if Geralt had given her a gift rather than just returned a greeting. Her sparkling blue eyes couldn’t help but remind him of Jaskier, who apparently didn’t like being left out of the conversation.

“Sister Witcher?” he repeated, albeit with much more inflection, “What do you mean? Why Rosie, did you go out and become a Witcher while I wasn’t looking?”

Rosalina rolled her eyes as Jaskier slung an arm around her shoulders.

“Not at all, dear cousin,” she said, matching his teasing tone. “I simply went out and married one.”

Jaskier had the decency to look stunned. Rose just smirked and pressed an affectionate kiss to his hair before ducking out from under his arm and turning back to the market stall she had been perusing before their arrival.

“Have those Dwarven Spirits come in yet?” she asked the shoptender.

To his credit, he barely spared a glance for the strange witcher.

“Don’ know how tha’ witcher of yours stays conscious with the rate he goes through these,” the shopkeeper grumbled, pulling a full case of dwarven spirit from behind his stall and hefting it into Rose’s arms.

She humed noncommittally and dropped a few larger coins on the table.

“I already left the eggs with Rachel,” she said, turning away before the shopkeeper can finish counting out the money.

Wordlessly, Geralt reached for the crate, taking it off her hands and handing Roach’s reigns to Jaskier.

Rose beamed.

* * *

Approaching the little cottage was surreal. The soft breeze floated the scent of honeysuckle and white myrtle toward the travelers. Jaskier already had his lute out and was singing something that was making Rose laugh. Geralt watched them talk and sing animatedly as they approached the cottage.

Chickens scratched to the left of the house near by what looked to be a barn and a man rhythmically splitting firewood. The figure stood and wiped his brow, looking out toward the approaching the house. With a blink, Geralt recognized the dark hair and grizzled beard of Clandis. Older than he’d last seen him, but unmistakably the Witcher he knew.

“Geralt!” he called out with a wave.

He was smiling. A big, broad thing that engulfed his whole face and pressed wrinkles into the corners of his eyes. It sent a spike of fear shooting through Geralt before he shook himself mentally. The elder Witchers were not here. They weren’t at school any longer. There was no one to punish Clandis for showing an emotion like happiness so obviously. There was no one that would strap him to a table and force another potion down his throat for daring to have feelings.

Rose took the crate out of Geralt’s arms just in time for Candis to draw near, axe abandoned in the chopping block. In one fluid motion, Clandis thew his arms around the white haired man and they were… hugging. Well that was new.

“I’m glad you found what you were looking for, brother,” Geralt said softly into the other man’s ear. Softly enough that the humans wouldn’t have been able to hear it, despite how close they were standing. When he pulled back, Clandis’ eyes were shining with something Geralt couldn’t define.

He patted Geralt’s upper arm twice before turning to the other two.

“Clandis, this is my cousin, Julian,” Rose said by way of introduction, passing off the crate again. “You remember I told you about him.”

Clandis took the crate without so much as a nod, just pressed a small kiss into Rose’s forehead. It was so… casual. As if he were not breaking unspoken laws that they’d lived by since they were children.

Geralt took Roach’s reigns back from Jaskier and petted her snout absently.

“I’ve gone by Jaskier the bard for many years now,” Jaskier is informing the couple. His face looks a little red, perhaps he’s been getting too much sun since the weather’s been warmer. Geralt makes a mental note to wrestle the bard into a hat if it continues to be an issue.

“But you’re full name is Julian Alfred Pankraz, is it not?”

There’s a teasing lilt to Clandis’ voice. So subtle that the others might not pick up on it, but Geralt scowls at him. He thinks something’s funny, Geralt just hopes it’s not at his or the bard’s expense.

“Well, er, yes,” Jaskier starts but is cut off again.

“Viscount de Lettenhove?” Clandis pushed, smile building.

Geralt scowled. Viscount? His eyes snapped over to Jaskier, only to find the man even redder. It didn’t make any sense. Hell, when he’d first met Jaskier, the bard had been stuffing stale bread into his pants. True, money had been flowing more freely since then, but surely Jaskier would have mentioned a title at some point. Wouldn’t he? Maybe this was just another anachronism about the bard. Another thing like his soulmark that seemed so painfully obvious, but he never spoke about it, despite his endless prattle.

“Yes, well,” Jaskier stammered, “My brother holds that title now.”

Geralt caught Rose shooting the bard a questioning look, that the other man was staunchly ignoring. Clandis on the other hand, seemed to be staring at Geralt with something mischievous behind his eyes.

Geralt scowls at him, but it doesn’t have the intended result.

“Well let’s not just stand around outside. Come in, come in!”

The couple ushered them toward the cottage. It couldn't be larger than two rooms, with a chimney that puffed out smoke into the clear blue sky above the thatched roof. Sweet blooming honeysuckle climbed up the walls and chimney while a garden bloomed wild around the front of the house. Amongst the plants, Geralt spotted white myrtle, celandine and a Barbacane fruit tree. It was a Witcher’s paradise with most of the common potion ingredients growing in abundance just outside the walls.

Inside, there’s a large, scrubbed wooden table surrounded by a few chairs. A door stands open to a small room where a bed is neatly covered in hand-made quilts. The crate of spirits is barely on the table before Rose throws open a cupboard and starts unloading small, empty glass bottles.

“Well we can all catch up this evening, but while there’s daylight, there’s still work to be done,” she announces practically.

“We should really get back on the road before dark,” Geralt points out.

Jaskier’s wide eyes turn to him in confusion, but Geralt presses his lips together resolutely. Despite it’s comforts, he’s noticed what no one else seems to have about the house. There is no room for visitors. It is perfectly situated for two and Geralt has no intention on intruding on that intimacy.

“How are your stocks of potions?” Rose asks abruptly. “I was planning on making a stash of White Honey since the honeysuckle is in bloom, but I’ve everything for Swallow, Cat and Kiss too, if it’s more pressing. You must stay long enough to restock at the very least.”

Geralt blinks at her in disbelief for a moment before shaking his head.

“I don’t need you to…”

Before he can finish, he finds Candis’ hand on his shoulder.

“Come now, Geralt,” Candis’ green eyes are as bright as Geralt’s, if a slightly less off putting shade, as they stare earnestly at his fellow Witcher. “I owe you much, allow us to help you in this small way.”

Restocking on expensive and crucial potions was not a “small” thing to be giving and both Witchers knew it, but looking back at the two smiling humans, it was hard to say no.

After a long pause, Geralt swallowed, both his spittle and his pride.

“I did take my last Cat the other day.”

Rose and Jaskier’s smiles are downright blinding.


	2. Chapter Two - Jaskier

Witcher potions were disgusting. 

Jaskier had absolutely no idea before today that Geralt was regularly chugging drowner’s brains like they were going out of style. 

He had wrinkled his nose in disgust as Rose stirred the pot simmering over the fire, but at least the smell was dying down now that the potions were cooling. The Cat and the White Honey actually looked like quite nice liquors if they hadn’t been so carefully brewed with witcher runes. 

The Swallow has no redeeming qualities. 

Jaskier has no idea how throwing a yellow flower and a grey creature brain in alcohol could create the bright red potion that he’s seen Geralt down so many times. Magic, he supposed. Not a very satisfying answer, but an effective one. 

Rose had her sleeves rolled up to the elbow, which had the side effect of also putting her soulmark on full display. Jaskier had seen it often growing up. The two had been inseparable after their soulmarks appeared. He could trace the harsh lines of Clandis’ name blindfolded. Jaskier was a little embarrassed to admit it, even to himself, but the sight of the name now stoked the acrid sting of jealousy in his gut. 

It was unexpectedly hard to be here in this quaint little cottage in the middle of nowhere with his cousin happily married to her soulmate. It made the last many years seem woefully empty. 

Jaskier vividly remembered the morning he’d woken up to find a name on his foot. He’d been young, much younger than most people when their mark appeared, only about four or five. Young enough that he’d had to sound out the letters of the unfamiliar name. Young enough that he’d gone straight to his mother to show her the newly formed soulmark dressed only in his nightshirt. 

His mother had looked at him fondly, and indulgently listened to his prattle until he pulled himself up onto her bed and shoved the bottom of his left foot into his face. All at once, her face had got white as a sheet. 

Julian’s father had been called, then, and the closest mage shortly thereafter. 

“Can you remove it?” his father had asked, voice tighter and even less-pleased than Julian usually heard from him.

“Soul marks are given to us for a reason,” the old mage had explained calmly. “I would be doing the boy a disservice if I were to try to remove the name, and even then it would not remove the connection from his soul, nor his destiny.”

“Is it bad?” he’d asked his mother then, wiping his running nose on his sleeve. He hadn’t wanted to cry, but everyone was so serious that the tears were leaking out anyway.

“No, my darling,” his mother had said, taking to her knees in front of him and stroking his hair. “It’s simply… unexpected.”

Her eyes had looked sad all the same. Julian hid his face in her skirts and tried to stop the tears from falling. 

It wasn’t until that night that he found out what the problem was. 

His mother had come to tuck Julian into bed, a rarity, but a welcome one after the confusing and eventful day. He closed his eyes as she blew out the candle, but sleep was hard to find. He heard his mother creep out the room, then the soft creak of the door and his father’s whispered voice. 

“What are we going to do, Marina?”

“He’s just gotten his soulmark, Jarvin, it’s not the end of the world.”

“He’s bonded to a monster.” His father’s voice was a rasp of utter loathing. Julian couldn’t help but shiver despite the warmth of his bed. 

“Witchers were humans, once,” his mother said, though she sounded a little desperate. “Surely they must...”

“Not just a Witcher, Marina. The fucking Butcher of Blaviken.” Julian thought his father’s voice sounded like a very quiet dragon. Even hushed, the anger and hatred in his voice was unmistakable. 

Julian pulled the blankets up higher. He didn’t have any of those words on his foot. It didn’t say “Witcher” or “Butcher” or anything hard and nasty like that. No, the name on his foot sounded like a nice name. Geralt of Rivia sounded like a river running smooth over rocks or the melody of a song.

The next day, he’d asked his tutor about Witchers. His parents had obviously not thought to warn the teacher of the latest developments.

“Witchers are mutant abominations,” the man said, voice dripping with derision. “They are stripped of human emotions and given the ability to wield small amounts of magic so that they can kill the magical monsters that humans cannot.”

“They don’t have emotions?” Julian didn’t understand. “Then how do they love people? How do they have soulmates?”

“They don’t.”

Julian had thought about that for a long time. He’d chewed the thought over in his head for weeks. How could he have a soulmate’s name on his foot if his soulmate didn’t have his name in return? Did his soulmate even know that he existed?

Slowly, he’d heard about Blaviken. About men, women and children cut down in the street, their blood running in rivers down the main square because one Witcher had gone out of control. His Witcher. Geralt of Rivia had only been cast out when a group had been brave enough to beat him off with stones, or so the legend said. 

The appearance of Cousin Rosalina’s soulmark three years later had been a godsend. 

Julian’s father had been convinced that the family had been cursed. There was no other option in his mind for why two children in the same family could end up with Witchers for soulmates. Rosie’s parents had sent her away to live with Julian and their family until a “cure” could be found. Which of course, it couldn't. 

The two had grown up together, thick as thieves and constantly on the hunt for more information about Witchers and, more specifically, their soulmates. Together they decided that the myths that surrounded Witchers couldn’t all be true. If nothing else, they often contradicted each other. Furthermore, Julian just couldn't believe that his soulmate would indiscriminantly murder a town. There must be more to the story. Julian would find him, he decided. He would get the real story and tell it to the world. Make them listen, even if it wasn’t as exciting as the myth. Julian would make it exciting if he had to, make the world appreciate Geralt of Rivia no matter what. 

But when Julian had turned sixteen, his mother had died and his father, heartbroken and angry, sent Julian away to Oxenfurt and Rose back home. 

Oxenfurt had been interesting. He’d certainly learned a lot, inside and out of the classroom. It was there that he met his first paramore. It was there that he’d fallen in love for the first time. It was there that someone outside of his family had first seen the name on his foot and given him a pitting look.

He learned to keep his feet covered after that. If anyone asked, he had a stock of jokes about cold feet at the ready, but usually they were more interested in getting down to business than why their lover didn’t bother to strip off his socks. 

He had only just graduated when news of his father’s death reached Julian at Oxenfurt. He didn’t go back for the funeral. The letter from his brother made it quite clear that Julian would be challenged to a duel for his title. Julian didn’t want the title. He didn’t want to go back either and meet his brother’s newly-found soulmate, Jessinna Revelia, or see their doting expressions. 

So he changed his name, stole a lute from the school’s storehouse, and set off in search of adventure. 

It was a lot more work than he had expected. He’d always been good with music, but he hadn’t expected people’s stinginess. Very few were willing to give up their hard-won coins to a traveling minstrel. He was considering packing it all up and going back to Oxenfurt, when he’d spotted a silver-haired head across the room. 

He approached the witcher with his heart in his throat and received what could generously be called a tepid response. It didn’t take long for Jaskier to realize three rather important things. One, Geralt had no idea that Jaskier was his soulmate. Two, Geralt had a decidedly unfavorable view on destiny. And Three, his soulmate had a distinct image problem. 

There was nothing to be done about the first two. If Jaskier told Geralt the true reason he had approached him in that tavern, he had no doubt that he would lose the Witcher’s begrudging company. And he really did enjoy following Geralt around the continent. He enjoyed sleeping by campfires and singing silly songs until Geralt either punched him or was forced to stifle a smirk. Jaskier felt freer than he ever had in his life. For once, there was no expectation upon him. He would travel with Geralt, write songs about his successes and sing to increasingly generous audiences every time they happened upon a town. It wasn’t the life he had expected, but it was a life he adored. 

Jaskier began to look differently upon the mark on his foot. Perhaps this was the type of soulmate he was meant to have. Not a romantic love, but a platonic one. A companionship that filled him up in ways he never knew he needed. 

It would be easier to accept, though, if Geralt wasn’t quite so handsome. True, they’d both had their share of lovers in the time they’d known each other. Geralt often paid for his lovers at the local whorehouse, no matter how many willing participants he might have found at a tavern. At this point, Jaskier knew that the Witcher was far from the emotionless husk his tutor had once claimed, but it still stood that Geralt didn’t exactly do… attachments. 

Geralt scoffed at Jaskier for his many paramores, but never really commented beyond pulling the bard out of trouble when his newest love happened to have an angry spouse waiting in the wings. 

But now, Jaskier felt as if he was being confronted by the ghosts of everything he’d wanted as a child. Here was his cousin, happy, healthy and married to the Witcher whose name had appeared on her arm all those years ago. And here he was, fruitlessly chasing after his own soulmate like a loyal dog, no matter how many times Geralt tried to kick him away. 

And now he was helping his disgustingly happy cousin strain brains out of foul smelling liquid for said Witcher. Great. 

“You don’t have to do that,” Geralt’s said as he set down a bucket of water by the cottage door. 

“What?” Rose asked, her upper arms bulging against her linnen sleeves as she squeezed the liquid out of the muslin currently containing the strained out drowner grey matter. “Would you rather munch on briains while you’re trying to focus on killing something dangerous?”

Jaskier could hear the sarcasm in her tone, but Geralt, apparently, could not. 

“It’s not bad.”

Jaskier physically shuddered.

“Good Gods, Geralt,” he said, “If I’d known you were gulping down brain matter, I would have done something about it myself years ago.”

The Witcher just shrugged.

“You get used to it.”

Behind him, Clandis snorted as he came through the doorway, arms full of split logs. “You get un-used to it faster, trust me.”

“Hmm,” Geralt answered. 

Rose just laughed, the cheerful sound filling up the overheated kitchen easily. 

“And her I thought you were uncommunicative, Darling,” she teased, taking a log from her husband and placing it into the fire.

At first glance, Jaskier had thought her wedding ring was a simple pewter band, but upon further inspection it was in fact silver, carefully etched with little wolf heads like the witchers’ medallions and some of the same runes that adorned their silver swords.

It was obviously a very thoughtful and personal gift from a Witcher to his soulmate. Jaskier had to focus very hard on how happy he was for his cousin in order to swallow around the jealousy that threatened to choke him. 

It all felt so... domestic. So opposed to what Jaskier had come to expect of Geralt, and thus, all witchers. But perhaps Jaskier had been over hasty. Perhaps Gerlat did dream of something like this. A home with a hearth to return to after a long day of monster hunting. A spouse cooking him dinner and bottling him a myriad of potions. 

Jaskier tried to imagine himself in Rose’s shoes and found that he couldn’t. His soul longed too much for the open road, for an audience and the attention of people happily on their way to being drunk. He was much happier sleeping under the stars, knowing his Witcher was nearby should any trouble occur.

Now that he thought about it, he wouldn’t have expected Rose to want this kind of life either. They had been kindred spirits as children, running wild and free in the gardens whenever they could escape their lessons. Drawn to music and mischief rather than the mechanics of running a duchy or household. 

Still, she seemed happy, here bottling witcher potions with perspiration frizzing the whisps of hair around her face into a soft little halo of domesticity. 

“Well we’d better start cooking, if anyone wants to eat,” she said to the assembled men, setting her hands on her hips and making it clear that she would not be the only one cooking.

“My cooking skills have not improved since I saw you last,” Jaskier pointed out hesitantly. 

Rose raised an eyebrow but nodded. 

“You can pluck the chicken,” she allowed.

“I’ll slaughter it,” Clandis said, turning and exiting out the door as quickly as he had come in. 

Geralt shot a look at his retreating back but said nothing, just rolled up his sleeves and gave Rose a questioning look.

“Do you mind chopping vegetables?” she asked Geralt, when it became clear that he wasn’t going to speak first. “I don’t trust Julian’s knife skills.”

Geralt huffed out a laugh and Jaskier squawked indignantly. The white-haired man took the proffered collection of potatoes and carrots without comment, but Jaskier did catch him doing something complicated with the kitchen knife, apparently just to showcase how much more capable he was. Jaskier flashed him a rude gesture while Rose’s back was turned. Geralt just smirked, damn him. 

Later, once the chicken was plucked and gutted and crackling merrily over the fire, the four were able to sit at the scrubbed wooden table and talk. Clandis and Geralt seemed to have a shorthand all their own where they were able to run through a list of monsters and where they’d been slain in five minutes tops. The two humans looked on in bemusement before launching into much wordier explanations of what they’d been up to over the last ten years or so. 

Jaskier was surprised to learn that Rose had already been married before Clandis, shortly after Julian himself had absconded from Oxenfurt. She didn’t say much on the topic, saying only that “It was an arrangement I was happy to leave.” She’d always been good with herbs and quick with her hands, it wasn’t too much work to find a small town with a healer that was willing to teach her. That paired with her ability to find (and read) books on the subject gave her a head start to setting off on her own. 

“Then a witcher came into town looking for barbacane fruit and… well…” 

Rose reached across the table to take Clandis’ hand and they smiled at each other.

Jaskier just hoped his smile didn’t look as pained as it felt. 

\-----------

The cottage only had one room, but Rose set them up in the hay loft above where Roach and Clandis’ horse, Marrow, were stabled. The two men were accustomed to sleeping much rougher than that, but Rose still fussed a bit, bringing them out a quilt to share despite their bedrolls and the unseasonable warmth of the evening. Then she was gone, back to her house, back to her bed, back to her witcher. And Jaskier was left in the dark of the hayloft, listening to Geralt’s steady breathing and feeling as if there was an uncrossable cassam between him and his golden-eyed soulmate. 

Below them, Roach snuffled and shifted. Geralt adjusted his position as well, as if he and his horse shared the same discomfort. 

Jaskier knew, from years of sleeping close to Geralt, that it was almost impossible to tell from his breathing alone whether the witcher were awake or asleep. Hs breathing was deep and even no matter what his state of consciousness. His only tell was Roach really. If she was restless, so was he. 

Jaskier ran his fingers through the hay close to his head and mulled over the question that had been turning itself over in his mind since dinner. He wasn’t sure if it was too much to ask, if it would show his hand or if it just wasn’t any of his business. It was a question he knew he shouldn’t ask, but he desperately wanted to know the answer to. 

“What is it?”

Geralt’s low rumble felt so close in the darkness, as if it had come from right beside him, despite Jakier knowing there was a good few feet between them. 

“I can hear your mind working from here,” Geralt grumbled. It wasn’t an unhappy grumble though, just a sleepy one. It suddenly struck Jaskier that he wasn’t sure when he had started to know the difference. 

“How did Clandis know?” Jaskier said at last, phrasing his question carefully. “You’ve told me before that Witcher’s don’t have soulmarks, so how did he know that Rose was his soulmate?”

Just Rose showing him her soulmark wouldn’t have been enough. They were too easy to fake. Magic or tattoos or even just ink could create a reasonable fake. No one as jaded as a witcher would have looked at an unknown person and assumed that the soulmark was genuine. Not without a matching one of their own. Right?

Geralt let out a low hum and for a few minutes, Jaskier thought that was all the answer he was likely to get. 

“I saw her name. Before it was removed.”

Geralt said it calmly into the dark, as if this answer didn’t raise a million more questions.

“What do you mean, ‘before it was removed’?” Jaskier had to fight to keep his voice even.

“At Kaer Morhen,” Geralt said slowly as if he were picking out his words carefully, “our soulmarks were burned off on the day they appeared. It was thought that a soulmark would only serve to distract from a Witcher’s calling on the Path.”

Jaskier found himself speechless. Of all the reasons why Geralt wouldn’t have his name on his skin, someone intentionally burning off the letters had never crossed his mind. 

“Did it hurt?” he whispered when he found his voice again. Because it may not be the most important thing, but it was the question that settled in the pit of his gut.

“Not as much as other things,” Geralt said. His tone didn’t quite hit the flippancy he was aiming for. The dark hayloft seemed intimate somehow in a way that campfires in the middle of the woods or cramped tavern rooms never could be. 

Jaskier still winced. He had wanted to give Geralt many things over the years, make him feel every sort of way, but Jaskier had never wished his name to cause him physical pain.

“That’s terrible,” he whispered only to be greeted by a sharp bark of laughter.

“No,” Geralt said, voice losing any trace of mirth immediately. “It’s kind.”

“You think that robbing people of their soulmarks is kind?”

The silence that fell then felt as heavy as lead.

“You think it would be kinder to leave children with the names of people they will outlive and be despised by?”

Jaskier couldn’t even begin to puzzle that out, but for once, Gerlat didn’t leave the silence there for Jaskier to even try. 

“With the obvious exception of your cousin, how many people do you think would be happy to know their soul was bound to a Witcher? Can you even imagine what it must be like to find the name of a killer on your skin? And even then if, for some gods-forsaken reason, that person doesn’t mind the scars and the blood and the monsters, can you imagine having to watch that person grow old while you remain exactly the fucking same?”

Geralt’s breathing was harsh now, as if he’d just finished a battle rather than speak a few sentences. Jaskier found his eyes straining against the dark, desperately trying to see the other man’s face. He didn’t really want to see the pain there, the pain he could hear in Gerlat’s voice. But it seemed wrong to hear it without seeing that face he knew so well. 

“Geralt,” he said quietly. 

“It’s better to have the damn things burned off.”

Jaskier didn’t know what to say to that. He’d considered all of it before, considered how cruel it was to match up two people who could never grow old together. But he’d pushed it aside, reasoned that a few happy decades would be worth the pain later. He hadn’t thought about Geralt thinking about his unnamed soulmate’s feelings. Hadn’t thought how the witcher’s own self loathing would have extended to the faceless stranger in his mind. Because how could Geralt know how much young Julian had loved him, long before they’d ever met? How could Geralt know how much joy Jaskier felt knowing that his soulmate was so kind and selfless and strong? How could Geralt know when Jaskier had never told him?

And how could Jaskier tell him now? After a decade of keeping it a secret?

“They could never hate you, Geralt,” he said instead. “Not once they knew you.”

All he got in response was a soft huff. Not really a surprise. Geralt had probably used up several days worth of conversation in that impassioned little speech earlier, not to mention all the talking they’d done with Clandis and Rose. 

“Anyone with half a brain would be proud to have your name on their skin.”

That made Geralt chuckle. 

“You’re a hopeless optimist,” he said in the same tone he used for much more intense insults. 

“Perhaps,” Jaskier said with a shrug Geralt probably couldn’t see, but might be able to hear against the hay. 

For a long moment it was just their breathing and the soft noises of the horses below. Jaskier was on the brink of dozing off when Geralt broke the silence.

“You never mention yours either.” Geralt said, so quietly Jaskier might have missed it any other time. 

“I-- I didn’t want to make you uncomfortable,” he said truthfully. “It must be hard to have everyone else talking about it all the time.”

Geralt seemed to take that at face value and he didn’t say anything more. Jaskier’s mind kept spinning questions late into the night. It took a long time staring into the dark of the hayloft before he finally drifted off to sleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry about the wait, guys! I got half of this monster of a chapter written only to get held up writing about food. There's more I wrote about how they prepared dinner that adds absolutely nothing to the plot and only serves to educate about medieval cooking practices. Anyway, that got cut and I was finally able to give our boys some bonding time, hope it's not too OOC. 
> 
> If you feel so inclined, please leave a comment. They literally make my day! It fuels my writing to know you guys are actually out there, reading and engaging so if you have a moment, please take the time to comment for the health of my little writerly soul!
> 
> Hope you guys are all staying safe and healthy during this tough time.


	3. Chapter Three - Geralt

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Geralt's POV

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, so... in my rush to get away from cooking techniques last time I kinda skipped a rather important scene. So... Geralt's going to tell you about it now. Sorry if the timeline is a little confusing.

Sparring with another Witcher was an enjoyment Geralt didn’t get very often. The easy crash and dodge of swords wrapped in heavy burlap to dull their edges made Geralt feel like a child again. Better trained and armed with more dirty tricks than he’d been as a child, certainly. But the sense of fun was there. 

Clandis swung hard toward Geralt’s stomach, treating it more like a club than a sword. With a smirk, Geralt cast Ard, sending the other Witcher sprawling backwards into the grass. 

“Fuck you,” Clandis grumbled, pushing himself up off the ground.

Geralt couldn't hold back the laugh that bubbled up from deep in his chest. 

A few meters away, two brunette heads perked up from their chairs beside the door. Jaskier was plucking out some light tune on the lute (not something Geralt recognized, so he was probably composing) while Rose sat with her feet on his lap, stitching together an article of clothing that was more patch than trouser at this point. It was oddly… soothing, seeing the two of them there just enjoying the day, occasionally glancing up to see the two Witchers roughhousing like children in the meadow. 

It reminded Geralt of the calm after dinner the night previous. With a minimal amount of persuasion, Jaskier had picked up his lute and played for the little group. Perhaps unsurprisingly, Rosalina also demonstrated an aptitude for music when she produced a well cared for violin from a box under the bed.

Within minutes the cousins were grinning like children and playing songs that Geralt had never heard before. Clandis grinned and immediately began tapping his foot on the floorboards to add to the music like this was perfectly normal. The two instruments blended marvelously, but even more surprising were the words they sang. Beyond just harmony, they sometimes sang different words. The lyrics danced in and out of each other like birds playing with each other mid-air.

“Let’s wander, ‘til the fuckers demand an encore,” they sang together. 

Geralt had seen enough of the bard’s performances over the years to be able to see through the veneer of performance that he so often wore. Often, the bard’s smiles and silliness were a ploy, a little play he put on to coax coins out of unwilling pockets. This wasn’t that. 

With Rose and her fiddle, Jaskier was practically glowing with happiness, words and music winding together and flowing as naturally as a river.

“Come and rip off my socks like you're blasting the locks off of a bank vault,” they sang together before Rose’s high, light voice called out “Halt!”

For a moment, everything stopped and Geralt held his breath, unsure what had changed so suddenly. Even Rose’s bow had paused midair above the strings of her fiddle and everything in the little house seemed to hover on a knife’s point for a breath, before they both came back together for the next line, “This time we’re done for.”

Jaskier was grinning as they broke into the chorus, his eyes bright and shining so blue even in the dim firelight. His fingers danced over the strings of the lute as easily as ever, but his focus was entirely devoted to Rose, keeping her in his view so that they could continue weaving together their voices into a tapestry of a song. 

“Let’s hide under the covers, we don’t know what’s out there, could be wolves…”

As they lingered on the last word, Rose spun around to throw a wink to her husband, so quick and sudden that Geralt swore he saw the other man stumble over the beat he was keeping with his claps and stomps. 

“So hold me darling like you used to, so tight I’d bruise you. I’d bruise you, I’d lose you too.”

The song continued, but Geralt found himself distracted by the look in Jaskier’s eyes. This was a song that was important to him, it caught in the corners of his eyes and bled through his fingers like only Jaskier’s favorite songs ever seemed to manage. But Geralt had never heard it before. In the years on the roads and countless nights in taverns, performing for the masses and the quiet nights around campfires in the middle of the wild, never once had Jaskier so much as hummed a bar of this song.

Was it special? Was it Rose’s song alone? A song that the two of them shared, something beyond a mere song, which simply couldn’t be shared with anyone else? If not, why had it never come up before? Or worse, did Jaskier simply not play it when Geralt was around?

Geralt forced himself to shake off his malaise with a swig of ale before joining Clandis’ stomping rhythm just in time for the climax.

“We don’t know what’s out there, could be ghosts or monsters or a nest of vampires, I dunno!”

When the song concluded, Rose flopped dramatically into a chair, setting her instrument carefully aside. 

“I’m surprised we still know all the words!” she exclaimed, “How long has it been since we wrote that? 10 years? 12?”

“Fourteen years, I think,” Jaskeir admitted, brushing nonexistent dust from his doublet. 

“Sweet Melitele,” Rose sighed, stealing a sip from Clandis’ mug of ale before continuing her questions. “What have you been working on lately? We generally hear your songs eventually, but I’d love to hear what you’ve been composing lately.”

Geralt hadn’t been able to contain his grimace at the memory of Jaskier’s most recent ditty. It was a truly bawdy account of a court where he had spent the previous winter, mostly in the nude if the song were to be believed. 

“Well, I’ve been playing around with a love song,” Jaskier admitted, fingers dancing over the frets of the lute. “I would value your opinion on it, Rose.”

Geralt couldn’t contain his disbelieving snort. 

“I’d hardly say it could be called a love song,” Geralt said, hoping that Jaskier was not about to regale his cousin with a detailed account of his sexual misadventures.

Jaskier looked up at him then, a flash of shock and hurt dancing over his features before he caught Geralt’s meaning. 

“Oh not that one, you clod,” he exclaimed, hands shooting out in a wide gesture of exasperation. “A different one. I-- I don’t think you’ve heard any of it yet.”

“Well don’t leave us in suspense!” Rose broke in, crossing her ankles and resting the fiddle on her lap. 

“Well, it’s not finished, so…”

Rose simply waved her hands in a ‘well go on then’ kind of motion until Jaskier brought his lute back up to a playable position. 

“Feel free to join in if you like, Rose,” Jaskier said quietly. It seemed out of character somehow and Geralt was tempted to try to catch the bard’s eye, to assure him that he didn’t have to play if he didn’t want to. 

But then Jaskier’s fingers were on the strings and the music began. 

“It’s what my heart just yearns to say, in ways that can’t be said

It’s what my rotting bones will sing, when the rest of me is dead

It’s what’s engraved upon my heart, in letters deeply worn

Today I somehow understand the reason I was born

He promises to fight them all, when it all becomes too much

And he, he curses at the world for leaving him behind and he’s falling out of touch

And she is broken in ways he cannot know 

She brushes her hand through his hair, he’s got so much fuckin’ hair,

And he holds her close, just to keep the world at ba-a-ay

And when they’re sure no one can hear them

She’ll turn to him and say, she’ll turn to him and say

‘It’s not fair, it’s not fair how much I love you

It’s not fair, ‘cause you me laugh when I’m actually really fucking cross at you for something,’

And he’ll say

‘Oh how, oh how unreasonable,’

  
  


Jaskier’s voice caught on the last word and Geralt felt the unreasonable urge to reach across the table and take his arm. To wrap Jaskier up in his arms and take away this feeling that was bringing him to the edge of tears.

But Geralt didn’t move and Jaskier didn’t hesitate, simply continuing to the next line of the song.

“‘How unreasonably in love I am with everything you do,

I’ll spend my days so close to you, 

‘Cause If I’m standing here maybe everyone will think I’m… alright.’”

Jaskier strummed for a while and Geralt thought that might be it. That might be all of the song that Jaskier had worked out so far. But then there was more.

“‘How unfair, how unfair,’ they’ll sing as they dance across the darling rooftop wreck

He’ll trip and she’ll pretend not to have seen

Burying her head into his chest and clinging to the moment

‘Where have you been?’ she’ll whisper

‘I’ve waited oh so long for you to come,’

And as the stars above them hum and hear them,

He’ll turn to her and say, she’ll turn to him and say,

‘It’s not fair, it’s not fair how much I love you

It’s not fair ‘cause you make me ache, you bastard,’

And they’ll say

‘Oh how, oh how unreasonable

How unreasonably in love I am with everything you do

I’ll spend my days so close you, ‘cause if I’m stood here

Then I’m stood here, and I’ll stand here. 

I’ll stand here with you.’”

  
  


Geralt knew he wasn’t exactly a musical connoisseur. He knew that Jaskier’s songs were designed to reach into the hearts of his audience and make them feel enough to give their hard-earned coin for the fleeting pleasure of music. But in that moment, Geralt had felt as if Jaskier had cracked open his own ribcage and presented his heart to the other three people in the room. The song felt bloody and raw, like a fight with a gryffin. It settled in Geralt’s gut in a strange way he didn’t know what to do with.

Then Rose had clapped, quickly joined by Clandis’ applause and then Geralt’s own. The spell had been broken and things had gone back to normal. Rose and Jaskier had played a few more songs before Geralt and the bard retired to spend the night in the hay loft.

But now, in the light of day with Jaskier’s gaze catching Geralt’s across the half-wild garden, the witcher felt the same feeling settling low in his belly. It felt almost like the pleasant ache of a large, warm meal. Except it wasn’t nearly so well settled. The feeling churned and writhed like a living thing before striking up into his chest to hit somewhere behind his sternum. 

Before Geralt could identify it further, he felt something slam into his left side and tumbled away from the force of Clandis’ responding Ard spell. 

“Don’t let your guard down, daydreamer,” the other witcher taunted from his position, also splayed in the grass, several feet away.

Geralt couldn’t help the laugh that bubbled up from deep in his chest. He was still laughing when he pushed himself up and offered a hand to his brother in arms. 

With a wicked grin, however, Clandis used the hand to pull Geralt down again. Luckily, this time he was expecting it, and was able to turn the tumble into a roll over Clandis’ head and come up brandishing his practice sword before the other witcher could get a strike in. 

They battered back and forth for a while after that, striking out with increasingly dirty tricks until they devolved into a friendly wrestling match.

At some point the two cousins had wandered over to the garden fence and were standing there watching the witchers tussle in the grass. That in and of itself wouldn’t have been particularly unusual, but as Geralt drew in a deep breath in preparation to throw Clandis off, his enhanced sense picked up on a rather distinct smell--that of female arousal. 

Clandis took that moment to elbow his brother hard in the chest. Geralt barely had time to grab the other’s arm before he was sent sprawling.

Clandis landing on top of him was almost enough to knock the air out of their lungs, but despite this, Geralt was quick to learn up and whisper in his ear. 

“As much fun as this is, I think you had better attend to your lady,” he rumbled, trying his best to keep the amusement out of his voice and ultimately failing.

Clandis looked confused for a moment before he stopped breathing through his mouth and picked up on the same scent. This close, Geralt got to see his pupils dilate as he looked over toward his wife. For her part, Rose was leaning on the fence, biting her lip and watching the two men roughhousing just beyond her garden gate. 

With one final push, Geralt knocked the other Witcher off of him and got up off the ground with as much grace as he could muster. 

“I need to go into town for a few things,” he announced, although husband and wife were far too caught up in looking at each other to pay him any mind. “Why don’t you come with me, Jaskier. We can get a hat while we’re there.”

“A hat?” Jaskier repeated, looking at Geralt as if he’d just announced that they come back with a harpy egg rather than a fashion item. 

“Hmm,” Geralt agreed. “You’ve been getting too much sun,” he said by way of explanation. Hell, even now, Jaskier’s face was looking a bit pink. He didn’t want to be on the road with Jaskier’s complaints when the skin started peeling off his nose. 

“Right,” Jaskier agreed, sounding a bit dazed and utterly ignoring the two lovebirds as they tangled their arms around each other. Geralt just hoped that they could get far enough away that he wouldn’t have to hear the noises they’d make. 

“Too much sun,” Jaskier repeated, following Geralt away from the little stone house.

* * *

  
  


The walk into the town wasn’t particularly long, but it was far enough and upwind enough that Geralt and Jaskier were out of hearing range before his witcher senses could pick up on anything too intimate. 

True to form, Jaskier kept up a steady stream of chatter as they walked. They’d left without much of their usual attire. Jaskier was lute-less and Geralt had forgone his armor, leaving with only his money pouch and the meteorite sword (still wrapped in burlap) slung over his back. 

“What are we getting in town?” Jaskier asked suddenly, cutting off his own line of thought.

Geralt just shrugged, like this had been his plan all along. 

“A hat,” he answered, trying not to sound stupid. He wasn’t sure it worked. 

“Since when do you care about my millinery choices?” Jaskier exclaimed, throwing his hands up in the air. “And that can’t be all we’re looking for. What else?”

Geralt sighed and wished he’d had enough time to tack up Roach. Usually when Jaskier started asking questions that the witcher didn’t want to answer, he could busy himself with the mare. He could pick invisible sticks out of her mane or simply put her between him and the bard, but now it was just the two of them slowly picking their way along the packed dirt road. 

He looked down at his hands and realized that they were both still only in their shirtsleeves. He hoped that the villagers weren’t going to take offense to their state of undress when they arrived. 

“You said you needed some replacement strings last night.”

Jaskier gave him a very odd look that Geralt wasn’t quite able to identify.

“Is that an admission that you actually like my songs?” Jaskier teased. Teasing was good. Teasing Geralt knew how to deal with. 

“Hmm.”

“You did! You do like my songs,” Jaskier crowed triumphantly.

“Hmm,” Geralt repeated noncommittally. 

“Not such a fillingless pie now, hmm?”

Geralt rolled his eyes. “I stand by what I said.”

Only Jasiker didn’t respond with his usual bluster and overblown reaction. Instead he got quieter and his scent dulled a bit, as it only ever did when he was injured or truly upset. Fuck. 

“Right, well…” Jaskier mumbled, visablly trying to rally himself despite his hurt feelings. 

“You lie in your songs,” Geralt tried to explain. 

Jaskier’s eyes just widened and he looked even more hurt than before. 

“Your scent changes when you don’t mean what you say,” Gerlat changed again. “When you sing in taverns and at parties, you don’t mean it most of the time.”

Jaskier didn’t say anything. He was still just starting at Geralt with those large, startled eyes. 

“You meant the song you sang last night,” Geralt finished, lamely. He felt as if he’d waded into a river he’d expected to be shallow, only to find the bank dropped from under his feet and now he was struggling to keep his mouth above the water line. 

“Which one?” Jaskier asked softly. If not for Geralt’s enhanced hearing, he might not have heard the question of the gentle plodding of their feet on the hard packed dirt road. 

And then Geralt had a problem. Usually he knew the titles to all of Jaskier’s songs before they were ever performed for the masses. He knew how each line was hammered out around campfires. He knew the titles and every variation that Jaskier had considered. But he didn’t know this song. This was a song that Jaskier had deliberately kept hidden, deliberately not hummed or played as they meandered around the continent. It was a song he had kept from Geralt specifically. 

But how did you describe a song you didn’t know the name of? One you didn’t remember most of the words to, only the aching feeling it had left behind?

“O-oh how,” Geralt winced at his own gravelly singing voice. There was a very good reason he had never sung in front of Jaskier before. The witcher’s voice was a far cry from the sweet tones of the bard. He’d been able to sing once, long ago, but all of the screaming he’d done during the trial of the grasses had ruined his vocal cords permanently. 

Still, he muddled through. 

“How unreasonable, how unreasonably in love I am…” Geralt trailed off. He couldn’t remember the next line. Only that it had been sappy and Jaskier had looked so wrecked when he sang it. 

“That one,” Geralt said gruffly, chancing a glance over to Jaskier.

He expected to see the other man wincing, like he did when they walked into a tavern where another bard was singing off key. Instead Jaskier’s eyes were wide and his mouth open.

“Sorry,” Geralt felt like he was blushing. He hadn’t blushed properly since Eskel had sat on him in training when they were both thirteen years old and his dick had responded as if Eskel were a busty whore rather than a wiry boy. But he might be blushing now. He’d just used his ruined voice to sing a song that was obviously very important to Jaskier, to his face. Of course he was angry. What artist wouldn’t be upset to have their work bastardized before them?

“You can sing?” Jaskier cried. Geralt startled when he felt the bard’s hands clasp around his upper arm. 

“Not well,” Geralt pointed out, staring flabbergasted at the huge smile spread across Jaskier’s face. 

“We’ve been traveling together for _years_ and you’ve never once thought to bless me with your dulcet tones?” Jaskier shouted to the heavens.

“Dulcet?”

“Sweet and soothing as Melitele’s bosom—”

“Don’t fucking lie to me, Jaskier,” Geralt growled, jerking his arm out of the bard’s grasp. 

Jaskier just blinked a few times before narrowing his eyes at the Witcher. 

“You just said that you can tell when I’m lying,” he pointed out. “So tell me, my darling Witcher, am I lying to you about your lovely singing voice?”

Geralt locked his jaw and sniffed as he looked away. Just because Jaskier was telling the truth didn’t mean… didn’t mean that Jaskier was _right_.

“Thought you had better taste,” Gerlat gumbled. 

Jaskier laughed, loud and bright and looped his arm through Geralt’s elbow. He found himself automatically bringing up that hand to rest at his ribs as if he were some gallant knight escorting a maiden rather than a dirty monster hunter receiving a ribbing from his bard. 

“You really liked the song?” 

Jaskier’s eyes looked almost unearthly blue in the midday sun. Geralt tended to forget how tall Jaskier was until they were beside each other like this. Shoulder to shoulder, it became apparent how well-matched they were. In a different world, one where Geralt hadn’t been made a witcher, they might even look similar. They were of a height and without his white hair, yellow eyes and battle-trained muscles they might even look like… Geralt cut off the thought abruptly.

“ _You_ meant it,” Geralt said by way of answer. 

Luckily, Jaskier seemed to take that as enough of an answer. He didn’t drop Geralt’s arm though and Geralt didn’t shake him off either. 

“Are you the man or the woman?”

Geralt hadn’t meant to ask the question, it just slipped out before he could think better of it. Jaskier looked surprised again, but not angry at least. 

“In the song?” he asked and Geralt nodded. “The woman.”

Geralt just nodded again. Jaskier had explained before that even though roughly 3% of the population had a soulmate of the same gender, the majority of audiences still preferred to hear about men and women lovers in songs. There were exceptions like the great ballad of Giaia and the like, but Jaskier’s songs were still designed to sell above all else. 

He was tempted to ask who the man was. If it was Jaskier’s soulmate. But Geralt caught himself just in time before the damning words slipped out. 

Jaskier didn’t seem to mind when Geralt slipped into his usual silence. 

The bard didn’t ask any more questions, but neither did he release his hold on Geralt’s elbow. They walked that way until they crested the hill and were in sight of the village, Jaskier humming the melancholy little tune from last night as they went. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The two songs used are from The Amazing Devil, Wild Blue Yonder and Fair. Yes, I did change some of the words to better fit them to this fic, but really they're both unfairly applicable. 
> 
> Comments make my day, if you are so kind as to leave one.


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